Who is judging our judges?

Sounds like we’re heading toward the 3 strikes and you’re out approach.

I’m actually a fan of this. I think a second chance, and then a third, is a fair amount of leeway to give someone. After that, it’s pretty obvious you don’t care about whatever the law is you’re breaking.

Nick D, try reading the article before asking if I vote

dubious75 said :

Troll or naive?

Troll

Swaggie said :

Note that the general public are NOT considered a stakeholder….

Don’t you vote in elections?

Where do you draw the line

It’s been drawn. It’s called the law. If you can’t see why having popularly elected judges making decisions pursuant to the mood of a vocal minority is a bad idea, well, you’re the reason why we shouldn’t have popularly elected judges.

But enlighten us anyway. How many cars should you steal before you’re locked away for the term of your natural life? Because the path you’re proposing will set the answer at ‘1’ – or are you soft on crime, like these namby pamby judges, giving people second chances they don’t deserve?

Nice troll! I was hoping we’d get to this. We’ve pretty much exhausted heaping sh!t on the twats involved in the actual collision so it was only a matter of time before the torch and pitch-fork wielding mob that is RiotACT would turn its attention to the underlying causes.

Let’s not be pansying about with your proposal though – let’s bring vicarious liability to the masses. How about, as well as the judge – we string up the DPP for not presenting their case in a water-tight enough manner, go after the parents of these maggots because after all it was their defective DNA and crap parenting that contributed to the offender being the way they are … hell you could probably get school teachers, friends, relatives the list goes on …

http://www.chiefminister.act.gov.au/media.php?v=5911&m=53&s=5 is a the process that’s currently followed with ‘stakeholders’ all being consulted as to who should be appointed and the final decision made, in effect, by that self seeking publicist Corbell. Note that the general public are NOT considered a stakeholder….

So judges should be appointed according to popularity rather than ability?

Well, Aurelius, methinks that letting a guy off after he’s stolen 20-something cars and written them all off, is possibly being a little soft. The guy should have been in the slammer a long time ago. Three car thefts? Ten car thefts? Fifteen car thefts?

Where do you draw the line and say, “I don’t believe your bollocks about being sorry, and I believe that you will reoffend in a very short time. You are a danger to yourself and society. Off to the gallows with you!”

Judges should have the ability to offer third \ fourth \ fifth chances taken away from them, and force the judges into actually punishing someone for a committing a crime.

The problem is that a judge must make findings based on laws, not personal opinion, based on the facts which are presented to them at the time. They can’t turn around and sentence someone to 10 years jail without laws permitting them to do so.

What needs to be done is the laws changed so that judges can not offer third chances. Sure if you break the law and get caught, the action of getting caught may be enough to place you on the straight and narrow, thus jail probably won’t do anything, but if you have a frequent flyers card for the back of a police car chances are the you are not going to learn from your mistakes because you have been arrested and placed infront of the courts. Infact you may even see it as a badge of honour.

Anyone who thinks judges being elected will make things better should look at those in our society who *are* elected, and have a long hard think about their idea.

More seriously though, have you ever sat in a court all day and watched the process? Watched court cases come up, and watch the sentences that are handed down? Or have you just decided you know best without actually knowing what goes on?

Sounds like the OP would be all for the government setting up a Pre-crime Analytical Wing to stop this kind of thing happening again.

I agree that judges seem to have little accountability. I think that as a society we are getting frustrated and annoyed with repeat offenders getting away with crimes where there was intent or obvious disregard for the law.

Now I’m not saying that some one who is on trial for something that a “normal” person may have done in an accident should face a harsh sentence. Say someone driving to work at or below the speed limit in good weather conditions swerves to miss a kangaroo and hits a parked car. There’s no intent there. No disregard for the law. Then say some one who is a little preoccupied with something or who forgets to look left and right at a T intersection and has an accident. Again, there’s no intent, and minimal disregard for the law.

But some one who is a repeat offender, who runs from the police, who drives well in excess of the speed limit, yeah, the penalties should be harsh, with strong minimal sentences.

So, how would we change this? Not by just writing to this forum. Start writing to your local members of parliament. Or perhaps there is the option for a Citizen Initiated Referenda (CIR) in Australia? http://www.theindependentaustralian.com.au/node/34 This is where a certain number of voters nominate a proposed law / change to our constitution. If enough voters put their signature to it, it can become law. I’m no expert on it, perhaps some one else could provide more information on if CIRs can be used in Australia.

Another thing to consider here is how comfortable would we be as a society with these harsher penalties. I think that yes, if a stranger did something like Justin (Mully) Williams did, then we’d pretty much all would say “throw him in jail to rot”. What if it was not a stranger though? What if it was a friend or relative? What if this friend or relative had done something wrong at age 16 but had cleaned up their act and was say 26 with no convictions since age 18? Would we say “give them another chance”? Personally for something like drink driving, I’d advocate no second chances, probably even if it was a friend. I don’t think it is always clear cut though.

Absolutely. About time magistrates and judges were held accountable for their decisions.

Of course this country would need to embark on a program of prison building to accommodate all the scrotes.
And not luxury 5-star prisons like John Stanhope’s, either: No TV, no internet, no army of useless social workers, no conjugal visits, no visits for those that fail a drugs test, and no hugely expensive contract caterers – just beans on toast or sausages and mash.

Just concrete cells, camp beds, big barbed-wire fences, and guards with shotguns and german shepherds.

About time criminals stopped getting a free ride and got punishment instead.

Accountability is a reasonable request. I think a ‘balanced scorecard’ type reporting mechanism where recidivists, the results of their actions and the magistrates responsible for sentencing should be published on a regular basis. The public can then see clearly which magistrates are handing out what sentences and how effective they are.

Well there’s an Alan Jones/Pauline Hanson simplistic post if ever I’ve seen one. If the answer was that simple I’m sure some of the greater minds in society would have figured it out by now. Unless you’ve chanced on something the entire legal system of the country has missed for years. Hmmm, being a betting man, I think I’ll put my money on the learned ones.

I agree but Judges will never be liable for their decesions (findings – as in that the court found with what it could see). Judges are appointed by Ministers (some drink and drive for the good it does the public while looking the other way).

Minsters have membership in political parties that accept brown paper bags in back rooms for ‘election funding’ (the bribe). Some ministers even get their hand picked staff to act illegally while knowing that any criminal charges would result in no conviction because the minister only needs by law to rig an election to be re-elected. Now the police will not investergate anything criminal done by a Minister because their chance of conviction of a criminal offence is 0%

As for not happening – how do you know that?

I know that Judges currently reward Social Housing Intoxicated Drunks Junkies with the ability to assault, threaten, and stalk younger people for fun – I have never seen the A.C.T. Government or so called Police make a statement about that; Perhaps the AFP and A.C.T. Government are to busy kicking in doors and paying Drunk Junkies $1k so they can get cheaper deals?

I have never seen any thing that of one Judge making a real complaint against a fellow Judge or the Government.. They are all as corrupt as each other, and not one here in the A.C.T. has any interest in Justice what-so-ever.

Troll or naive?

Agreed that the scumbag should never have been on bail, in two jurisdictions..

The problem lies within laws with lax sentencing options, the fact that any decent harsh sentence will be automatically appealed and overturned, the ability of judges having to take every hardship of the offender’s life into account when sentencing, the ability for crims to appeal on administrative technicalities and having a bunch of soft judges who thinks beneath each offender is a really nice person.

On bail in NSW claiming the “unfit to plead” defence after he almost killed himself the first time, bragging about it on facebook and on subsequent charges for other offences just proves the point.

A lot of things need fixing besides just the judges.